Big bores, breech-loading, single-shot rifles that were powerful and accurate — that was the reputation of Sharps rifles in the mid-19th century as the United States pushed its way ever farther West. One could argue the Sharps is the first rifle that could be called a long-range hunting rifle or sniper rifle. Hunters and sharpshooters relied on it so heavily that it’s one of the few designs converted for use with metallic cartridges.
Christian Sharps patented his first repeating rifle in 1848. Within five years, the gun underwent multiple model developments and production contracts. Less than a decade later, the Sharps rifle saw action on both sides of the American Civil War.
By the time the Model 1874 Sharps, aka “Old Reliable,” was introduced, the falling block rifles had cemented their place in American arms history as some of the most well-built, reliable, and accurate guns on the market. Discerning shooters of all kinds flocked to Sharps rifles, creating a legacy that lasts to this day.
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Sharps Rifle and Sharpshooters
There’s a reason why snipers are often colloquially referred to as “sharpshooters.” Within the first six months of the outbreak of the Civil War, units of top shooters were employed to target high-profile individuals from greater-than-average distances — snipers.
Dressed in green wool uniforms, the first Sharpshooter unit was raised by Hiram Berdan, inventor of the Berdan repeating rifle. While some of these men were armed with Berdans, plenty of other firearms, including Sharps rifles, were also seen in the ranks.
Because of their accuracy and the falling-block breech-loading design, Sharps firearms were quick and efficient on the battlefield and easy to reload while remaining prone and without much movement — perfect for soldiers whose job was to stay hidden and pick off valuable targets in short order.
Free Range American contributor Kurtis Martonik previously worked as a gunsmith for C. Sharps Arms Company, building modern versions of these guns by hand. Naturally, he has built a number of Sharps rifles for himself and his family members.
“The Sharps rifle was selected as the weapon of choice for hunters and explorers alike, and you can find specific mentions of the rifles in books of the era,” Martonik said. “They had a certain legendary quality to them even back then, when they were relatively new.
“They were strong and could handle some of the biggest cartridges in existence at the time. And those who wrote about them treated them differently and never shied away from going into every detail about the rifle,” he added. “While Winchester claimed the ‘Rifle That Won the West’ moniker, Sharps owners will often counter that the legendary Sharps rifle ‘Made the West Safe for Winchester.’”
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What’s in a Name?
Today, we know the iconic Sharps “Old Reliable” rifle as the Model 1874, although it was actually introduced in 1871. The Model 1874 designation came along later. It could be because 1874 was the year the company was restructured, and the rifle’s namesake died. It was also the year the Sharps rifle was used in the notorious Second Battle of Adobe Walls in Texas.
Regardless of how the rifle got its name, it’s an interesting note about the company as a whole that Christian Sharps divested himself of the Sharps Rifle Manufacturing Company due to poor business relationships in 1853, just two years after it was established. He parted ways with his business partners, Richard S. Lawrence and Samuel Robbins, who helped bankroll the rifle company.
Lawrence and Robbins continued without Sharps for nearly two decades. The guns they made still used the Sharps’ name until the company was dissolved in 1881. At that time, Christian Sharps had already been dead for seven years.
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Hunting With the Sharps Rifle
The gun didn’t earn its Old Reliable nickname on the battlefield, but rather from its use by some 20,000 Great Plains buffalo hunters. The Sharps rifle was capable of dealing death to big game with a single shot and at great range, something necessary for dispatching buffalo humanely.
Some hunters even carried multiple Sharps rifles in their arsenal, switching between guns when the barrels got too hot from extended firing sessions on one buffalo after another until they were nearly extinct.
The rifle’s accuracy at long distances allowed buffalo market hunters to pick off animals from hundreds of yards away, enabling them to decimate an entire herd, one at a time, without disturbing the remaining living animals. Yeah, just like that part in Wyatt Earp.
The Sharps, especially the carbine versions, are often confused with the later Spencer rifle, because they both have a similar profile, though the receivers are distinctly different. Like the Spencer, the Sharps is a lever action rifle, but the lever (which doubles as a trigger guard) simply opens the breech so a fresh cartridge can be loaded on a Sharps, as there is no magazine to pull rounds from. The Spencer held ammo in a tubular magazine inside the buttstock.
When the lever on a Sharps is closed, it closes the breech and the hammer is ready to be cocked and fired.
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The Legendary Accuracy of the Sharps Rifle
The accuracy of a Sharps rifle was more than a good sales pitch. It was backed up by actual results, time and time again. One of the most iconic testaments to the gun’s precision came out of Texas.
During the Second Battle of Adobe Walls in June 1874, a war party of more than 700 Kiowa and Comanche Native Americans attacked a buffalo hunters’ camp. Twenty-eight men and one woman defended the camp that day. One of the hunters there that day was Billy Dixon.
He spotted one of the tribal chiefs on a rise in the distance. He borrowed a “Big .50” Sharps, took aim, and toppled the warrior from his horse. After the battle ended, an Army surveyor officially recorded the distance of Dixon’s shot to be 1,538 yards, or 7/8 of a mile.
The guns also proved their accuracy under more controlled circumstances on the range. During an 1877 competition at the Creedmoor range in New York, American shooters wiped the floor with the British competition — many of the Americans were using Sharps rifles.
A shooter from the British team was so impressed by their accuracy that he visited the Sharps factory and shot an impressive 16 consecutive bull’s-eyes at a distance of 1,000 yards using a Model 1877 Long Range Express rifle.
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Pop Culture Popularity
The silver screen has often breathed new life into older firearms designs, especially with landmark Westerns, and the Sharps is no exception. Matthew Quigley (Tom Selleck) in Quigley Down Under (1990) did for the Sharps Model 1874 what John Wayne Westerns did for the Colt SAA in the 1950s and 1960s, and what Harry Callahan (Clint Eastwood) did in the 1970s for the Smith & Wesson Model 29 in Dirty Harry.
The rifle was practically a character in the movie, and Quigley wasn’t at his full power without it — and it always seemed to come back to him, and he never seemed to run out of its custom ammunition either. There’s even a speech to go with the rifle.
“It’s a lever-action, breech loader,” Quigley says when describing his rifle after newly arriving in Australia. “Usual barrel length’s 30 inches. This one has an extra four. It’s converted to use a special .45-caliber, 110-grain metal cartridge with a 540-grain paper patch bullet. It’s fitted with double-set triggers and a Vernier sight. It’s marked up to twelve-hundred yards. This one shoots a might farther.”
The film’s iconic scene where Quigley shoots a bucket offhand, repeatedly, that was carried out to an extreme distance by a rider stirred the souls of seasoned and new long-range shooters alike.
It helped propel the Sharps Model 1874, then a 119-year-old design, to the forefront of people’s minds and led new generations of shooters to realize you don’t need a super-expensive rifle and scope to shoot at really long distances. You just need a good gun and lots of practice.
If you want to give Matthew Quigley’s epic bucket shot, check out the Matthew Quigley Buffalo Rifle Match. The 31st annual shooting competition is held every year in June in Forsythe, Montana. Registration for this year’s shoot is open from June 12 – 16 and the shoot is June 17 – 18.
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21st-Century Sharps Rifles
Even though Quigley came out more than 30 years ago, the light it shined on the Sharps rifle still shines just as brightly as it did in 1990.
The original Sharps Rifle Manufacturing Company ceased operations in 1881, but you can still buy a new Sharps rifle and even AR parts from companies bearing the Sharps name.
The Sharps Rifle Company of Virginia claims to be “the proud heir of the now legendary 19th-century rifles, embodying the spirit of the American Old West.” They can claim whatever they want, but the company makes AR components. They have nothing in common with the original single-shot rifles except the name.
Next, we have C. Sharps Arms Company of Montana. They produce brand-new, American-made Sharps rifles. Faithful to the originals, they even bear the “Old Reliable” trademark of the original Sharps Rifle Manufacturing Company.
As the trademark owner, C. Sharps Arms Company is the only gunmaker that can actually lay claim to that moniker, and they make some pretty excellent firearms.
Finally, several quality foreign reproductions are available on the market from companies like Pendersoli and Uberti, which even makes a very Quigley-esque repro called the Down Under. These are an excellent option for the historic arms aficionado who is on more of a budget and either cannot afford an original or Montana-made Sharps or simply doesn’t want to subject one of the originals to a trip on the range but still wants the thrilling experience of stretching a Sharps out to its limits.
The Sharps Rifle’s Lasting Legacy
Even though Christian Sharps had long since parted ways with the company by the time the guns that bore his name had gained notoriety as some of the best hunting rifles a man could buy, it didn’t matter if he was at the helm.
What mattered was that Christian Sharps laid the groundwork for high-quality, single-shot breech-loading rifles with his first patent in 1848. Without that solid foundation, none of the future developments would have mattered. Perhaps that’s why, after 150 years, Sharps rifles of all kinds — originals, reproductions, or brand-new — are highly sought by discerning shooters who prize accuracy above all else.
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